The Pie Whole
by PaBurke
Summary: In which the girl with the designation X5656 meets the Pie Maker, gets a job, falls in love and dies. Part of my Other Transgenic Stories.


The Pie Whole

By PaBurke

Crossover: Pushing Daisies

Summary: In which the girl with the designation X5656 meets the Pie Maker, gets a job, falls in love and dies. Part of my Other Transgenic Stories.

Disclaimer: None of this belongs to me. For entertainment purposes only.

Warning: Crack!fic. But seriously it's a crossover with Pushing Daisies, what do you expect?

Spoilers: Season One of Dark Angel, general premise of Pushing Daisies.

The genetically engineered female soldier with the designation X5-656 was 10 years, 2 months, 2 days, 9 hours, 47 minutes and 3 seconds old when she met the Pie Maker for the first time. X5-656, also known by her brother and sisters as Tinga, had been free from a horrible place called Manticore for 1 month, 18 days, 5 hours, 36 minutes and 51 seconds. She had met all sorts of men and women in the meantime, but she had never met anyone like the Pie Maker. For the Pie Maker was special in ways that even her genetically enhanced mind could not comprehend.

Tinga had been investigating the dumpster behind the Pie Hole for scraps of food. Surely, she thought, any place with such exquisite smells emanating from it would discard all substandard food. Alas, she did not find a single rotten strawberry or fuzzy blueberry or bruised apple.

What she did find was the Pie Maker, taking out the trash and running from the two women in his life, both forces of nature in their own right. When the Pie Maker threw the bag of trash at her, Tinga caught the bag.

The Pie Maker apologized profusely and Tinga listened to the apology in bemusement. In addition to his words, the Pie Maker offered a slice of any pie in the display.

Tinga accepted the pie offer with a silent nod, after all hunger was why she had been in the dumpster in the first place. The girl brushed off as much dirt as possible and followed the Pie Maker into the Pie Hole through the kitchen. She watched as the Pie Maker skirted around the two arguing women and pointed at the half-full display counter. The wonderful smells made the girl pause. There were so many mouthwatering choices. She had never been offered such a selection before. She examined each pie with indecision.

"The strawberry pie is always good here," the girl called Chuck said.

"But what about the coconut cream?" the petite Olive countered. "We have barely been keeping up with the demand and there is only one slice left."

Tinga glanced between the two pies pointed out to her. She knew that either one would be a new experience for her taste buds.

The Pie Maker put a slice of each onto a pie and slid it before her. Olive handed Tinga a fork and then flitted to the door to welcome new, paying customers. The girl called Chuck slid into the seat next to Tinga and smiled. "Hi, I'm Chuck."

Tinga ducked her head and continued eating. The pie was better than everything she had ever tasted. She tried to use her discipline to eat slowly, but it was a challenge. Then she imagined that Colonel Lydecker was watching her and Tinga lost her appetite altogether.

Because the genetically engineered female soldier with the designation X5-656 knew how important it was to eat, she continued shoveling the pies into her mouth. She wasn't sure if she could enjoy the tastes anymore and now that she was concentrating, there was something… off about the strawberry pie, but then she had never tasted strawberries before, so how would she know?

Tinga finished her pies and slipped out the front door before any of the restaurant workers could stop her.

*

The genetically engineered female soldier with the designation X5-656 returned to the Pie Hole early the next morning when only the Pie Maker was in the building. He was preparing for the day and seemed to be making extra trips to the dumpster.

The Pie Maker smiled when he saw Tinga. "How 'bout a slice of apple pie to start the day right?"

Tinga stood there deciding. She had discovered in her short time outside of Manticore that everyone wanted something. What did the Pie Maker want from her?

"You could clean all the booths for me in payment," the Pie Maker said.

Tinga agreed to the exchange. She refused the pie until she had filled her side of the bargain, scrubbing every table and seat in the Pie Hole. About the time she was sitting down for a breakfast slice of Granny Smith Apple Pie, Olive and the girl called Chuck entered the building. Both women smiled at her.

"You show up like a lucky penny," said Chuck.

Olive stood at Chuck's shoulder, united. If the women weren't so tiny, Tinga might have considered being intimidated, but as it was, the X5 was already taller than Olive.

"Are you going to speak to us?" Olive demanded.

Tinga shook her head no. Words did her no good.

Chuck smiled. "Then we are going to call you Penny. You're good luck for us. I see that Ned put you to work already this morning. If you want more work and more food, come outside when you're done with your breakfast."

Tinga did end up seeing what the girl called Chuck had in mind. Curiosity from the cat genes, the genetically engineered female soldier with the designation X5-656 decided.

The girl called Chuck was in the back alley with planters and dirt and seeds. Chuck smiled when she saw Tinga and set her to work while the older woman watered the many different planters with budding flowers in the alleyway.

Tinga wondered why there were so many flowers but since they were paying her with pie (Key Lime-Banana Pie this time), she didn't care. Tinga had, of course, noticed that there were planters of flowers in the kitchen, but why did the Pie Maker need so many different ones to replace them? Normals were strange.

But these normals were kind. They encouraged her to stay and somehow, the Pie Maker managed to break through even Zack's genetically enhanced emotional shield (it was the Pinacoloda Cream Pie that did it).

The transgenic called Tinga stayed. She fell in love much to the joy of Olive and the girl called Chuck. She bore a baby boy she called Case. Then a horrible man known as Donald Lydecker wrecked her life and she left everyone behind (but that's a story for another narrator to tell).

While the man Tinga loved posted signs and submitted her picture to the people who decorated milk cartons, the Pie Maker and the girl called Chuck employed a private investigator named Emerson Cod to find her.

Emerson Cod looked for her but the people who worked at the horrible place called Manicore hid her well. The horrible people who worked for the horrible place killed the transgenic called Tinga. This again is the story for another narrator, but since Tinga was now dead and Emerson Cod had many contacts among those who deal with the bodies of the dead, the narration is once again the responsibility of this narrator.

The transgenic called Tinga was dead and that was how Emerson Cod found her. Dead didn't mean anything to Emerson Cod because he knew the Pie Maker. He also knew the Pie Maker's emotional guilt. So while Emerson Cod did arrange for the Pie Maker's path to safely intercept with the transgenic called Tinga, he made very sure that he was in a different state at the time of the meeting.

With much prompting on the part of Olive and the girl called Chuck, the Pie Maker went to where the horrible people from Manticore were keeping Tinga's body. Mostly due to luck, the Pie Maker found Tinga's body. He touched her and she came back to life.

The Pie Maker used his one minute before someone had to die to explain to the transgenic called Tinga his powers and her options. Tinga had never touched the Pie Maker before so she would not miss that and she was a genetically enhanced soldier, she did not have a problem with people who had benefitted from her death dying. In fact, the transgenic called Tinga knew that to protect the Pie Maker, she would have to kill everyone in the Manticore holding station and destroy all surveillance.

The genetically engineered female soldier with the designation X5-656 did as she decided. She killed all the personnel of the holding station, but the one guard that died because she had lived past her minute. Then she escorted the Pie Maker off the premises and authorized the holding station self-destruct. The Pie Maker and the transgenic called Tinga watched the explosion before going on their separate ways.

The Pie Maker returned to his pie shop called The Pie Hole and the transgenic called Tinga returned to her husband.

If Tinga had thought that the conversation with her husband about the horrible place called Manticore had been a challenge, it was nothing compared with the conversation about her sudden return to life and her family.

But we will leave that conversation to the privacy of her family's house. There are some places even narrators hesitate to go. All narrators care about is that the genetically engineered female soldier with the designation X5-656, the transgenic named Tinga and known to her boss and her husband as Penny lived a long, happy life with her husband and her son.

The End.


End file.
